


the words from her mouth, the inexplicably large hole in his heart

by jaydenbell



Category: Glee
Genre: Angst, Gen, Rape, Santana Lopez/Noah Puckerman-friendship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-09-22
Updated: 2011-09-22
Packaged: 2017-10-23 22:47:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 797
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/255921
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jaydenbell/pseuds/jaydenbell
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He was instructed to leave work early, by any means necessary, and pick her up from the hospital. He never realized the person he was picking up was someone he'd never seen in his life.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the words from her mouth, the inexplicably large hole in his heart

**Author's Note:**

> Fill for a prompt at the drabble meme.

Still confused and worried, Puck picked up a tired and broken looking Santana from the hospital main entrance like he was instructed. Rachel had called him half an hour before his shift was over and told him to make whatever excuse he had to to get there because he would be faster with the car (and she didn’t want Santana to have to sit in a cab or on the train with strangers right now).

Santana kept her head down, but Puck could see that she had been crying at some point, her eyes red, her cheeks smudged with tears. Her hair was messy, but she had attempted to pull it back into a ponytail. She didn’t appear injured, at least not enough to be in the hospital – she did have some scrapes on her knuckles that he could see. But she did look like she was going through something pretty stressful on the inside.

From the cryptic way his girlfriend had instructed he retrieve their friend, he decided it was best not to ask.

Santana looked up briefly at an intersection and said she wanted to be taken back to his place (his and Rachel’s place). He didn’t argue. He hadn’t really planned to take her back to her own apartment anyway with the state she was in.

When he pulled the car into the garage of their building and got out, he waited nervously for her to get out and join him. She held her head up now, glancing around her once before slipping her hand into his and walking right up against his side as he led her into the building.

Rachel was at the door when he opened it. “Santana?” she asked softly, cautiously, trying to look into her friend’s averted gaze.

Santana shook her head. “I can’t, Rach,” came her quiet reply.

“Rachel, what’s goin’ on?” Puck asked softly, the Latina girl still holding his hand and sharing his personal space.

Rachel raised an eyebrow at Santana, silently questioning if she was allowed to speak for her. Santana gave a small single nod.

“She was raped.” And she said it so softly, like whispering would make it less real, less impactful. They all knew it didn’t really work like that, but she couldn’t bring herself to say the words any louder.

Puck’s eyebrows went up sharply; he understood now what Santana ‘couldn’t’ do before now: talk. “Santana, this isn’t your fault. You – you need to talk to someone about this. It’ll tear you up inside.”

Taking in a shaky breath, she finally met his eyes for the first time all night. And spoke sharply. “You ever been violated?” She picked up volume, her eyes filling with tears. “Anybody rape you lately?”

The look on her face, it killed him. This was his best friend, and she was trying to keep quiet about something that would destroy her; that made his insides twist painfully. “I’m just trying to help.”

Rachel looked at him. “You can’t.”

“Do you know what it’s like to be so scared that there’s nothing safe left? To be so torn apart in a matter of seconds that you don’t ever remember feeling whole, feeling human? You know why on those tv movies the women are always hugging their knees in the corner of the shower with glazed over looks on their faces? It’s because there’s nothing else to do after that. There’s nothing that will ever erase the image of the bastard’s greedy eyes, nothing that will ever wash off the way his hands feel as they hold you down. Nothing!” Tears started rolling down her cheeks as she yelled, not really at Puck but just in his direction. “Nothing.” She coughed out as she began crying.

Rachel quickly pulled her friend into her arms, her own eyes filling with tears as she watched her break. Puck never let go of Santana’s hand, and she never let go of his. She only squeezed tighter as she cried, one arm wrapped securely around Rachel as she did.

**

Puck pulled a blanket over Santana’s sleeping form on the couch. She took one of the sedatives she had been sent home with (along with an emergency contraception pill that made her eyes get glassy all over again) and let herself drift off in a fitful sleep as Rachel rubbed her back.

“Maybe, um,” Puck started as he looked between his girlfriend and best friend uncomfortably. “Maybe we could sleep out here tonight. That way if she wakes up….”

Rachel nodded and squeezed his arm. “I’ll go get some more blankets.”

He stared at his sleeping friend. She didn’t deserve this, nobody did. And he felt powerless to help her. He hated that feeling more than anything he’d ever felt in his life.


End file.
